Garden give mute testimony to this fact.  There are surprisingly few good springs in Elk Garden.  A number of the traditional sites of the fort have no springs at all.

Magnified Portion of the Smith Map Showing Elk Garden Proper 

              Daniel Smith was on the committee that ran the line between North Carolina (Tennessee) and Virginia, and in doing so had a run in with East Carter’s Valley famous Tory, Major John Anderson.  Smith drew a map of the larger region about Elk Garden, and it is from this map that we know the general location of the Elk Garden Fort.  The map was drawn by the man who built the fort.  He was a professional surveyor.  The map is built to precise scale.  It shows “Elk Garden” to be between the forks of Big Cedar Creek, or south of the North Fork (current Elk Garden Creek) and north of the South Fork (current Loop Creek).   

             There are only two good springs within that zone.  One is partially flooded by the Hendrick’s Mill Pond.  The other is on the southern lip of Thomas Price’s land,  on a tract sold off of the current Ellenwood / brook estate (see following).  Tradition has it that Fort Elk Garden was ‘near’ the mansion of Thomas Price, now Ellenwood / brook.  It is south of the creek, and next to the old Indian trail, now State 80.